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Understanding the Astounding Novorossiyan Victories

Understanding the Astounding Novorossiyan Victories

heatrical fusion into actual-real events in Novorossiya and Ukraine have progressed such that informed readers and analysts alike were unprepared for the ‘Astounding’ reversal of fortune suffered by the KJ. Often retrospectively are critical moments in the evolution understood as fundamentally revolutionary. In anthropology these are punctuations within punctuated equilibrium theory.

In common parlance, used to describe similar within the sphere of War, is the term ‘game changer’. But in 4G warfare especially momentous events encapsulate qualities of a carefully pre-planned and staged phenomenon, whose timing and efficacy are calculated using a formalization process derived from fields of strategic modeling such as in game theory. There is no surprise to the simulated turn of events which characterize the two uninterrupted weeks of Novorossiyan victories. Witnessed were the total encirclement into cauldrons of more than a half-dozen battalions, totaling most of the KJ’s ready and equipped fighting force. To understand why the western public as well as analysts were prone to misunderstand the real situation, and instead situated their view upon pending doom for the NM and the Novorossiya project, is to understand some important concepts in the strategy of stage management of the news cycle and the creation of the simulacrum within which the publicly consumed false paradigm is rooted.

Novorossiya Militia can take Mariupol

This is a political reality, not just a military one. At the time of publishing, NM forces are just minutes from Mariupol. This much is understood by everyone. Mariupol is basically ‘undefended’ by KJ forces, but the local population by in large wants the NM to liberate them.

However, what is happening in the news cycle could not be better for the NM initiative. Rather than Western leaders calling upon Putin to stop the march of the NM into Mariupol, instead the news cycle is focusing on whether 1000 or 5000 Russian soldiers have entered Donbas. It really matters little whether it is 1000 or 5000, there is lacking any prescriptive measure from the west attached to this accusation. Lavrov has already explained, and provided evidence, that the ‘footage’ showing these movements are in fact CGI, ‘video games’, in his words.

Now the west has backed itself into a corner, because it latched onto more bad intel, even though its true that thousands of volunteers from across the Russian Federation are fighting alongside natives in Novorossiya. It wants to report an ‘event’, a weakness in western reporting, when in fact what has been going on for nine months is partly a gradual phenomenon coordinated in part and publicly by Russian NGO’s.

The most prudent thing, however, would be stage the spectacle of a Novorossiyan ‘uprising’ in front of government buildings, use older women and children with balloons: once enough NM fighters have bled into the city in plainclothes under cover of darkness, and emerge to defend the protests while simultaneously the actual operation takes place to take the city.

The Past and Future Course of the Conflict

Novorossiya has been winning this whole time, and we have been consistent about that. It should be sufficient for our reader to understand that the apparently prolonged nature of the conflict was not operationally necessary on the Russian part in simple terms, but only necessary in terms of the role of major extra-territorial actors (such as EU and US) have and for Russia to better understand Ukraine’s real nature and capacity, and in being able to demonstrate this real nature to the Eurasian integrationist segment of the EU’s industrial, and to a lesser extent financial, bourgeoisie; and to generate support worldwide from mass-publics, and to shift the popular discourse towards a sympathetic orientation towards Donbas people; and to change the political landscape of Ukraine. Russia operationally, even acting through its ‘revolutionary’ proxies in Novorossiya, aided and funded through Duma approved private NGO’s, could have steamrolled an operation clear through Kiev and had resolution in June. However, the following tasks would have been unfulfilled:

1.) Using rational choice theory to demonstrate to EU allies that Ukraine is under foreign, specifically US, occupation. This is also important under international law, because Russia’s interventions are not of an aggressive invasive nature, but of a liberatory one. The fact that the day before yesterday the US began to float a line that Russia ‘had invaded’ Ukraine with ‘two columns of tanks’, as reported by the outsourced to Al Thani state department paper of record ‘Al Jazeera’. Interesting to note here the total distortion of reality, almost intended to disqualify the entire article. Twice now the US has attempted to use Novorossiya’s pretending to be losing against it: that Putin now desperate is ready to do anything. They tried this, to no avail, with the Malaysian Flight downing. Now they are trying to say that Novorossiyan losses are the reason why Putin must act. But in fact we know that the Novorossiyans have all but destroyed the entire KJ force, in the south, encircling and routing them.

Simply saying that the US is in control of Ukraine is insufficient for EU allies to trust in Russian intelligence personnel. Intelligence is sufficient for Russia to trust in its own personnel and findings, but once this becomes a marketed good to a foreign government, that government will be reasonable in assuming that Russians are faking evidence to skew understanding of the European ally. If Ukraine is not acting in its own self interest, then it is acting in the interests of another. The unknowing/irrational actor model does not fit the rest of the known facts.

Thus, the Russians must show Europe, using rational choice theory or game theory, through the actions of Ukraine’s government that they are not acting in the best interest of Ukraine. Ukraine’s best interest is rather simple to understand: a unified federal state at peace with its neighbors, and gas on for the winter. They would have accepted the Chinese and Russian $15 billion bailout back in December 2013 whose terms did not include the austerity and privatization required by the IMF. They would have worked to modify terms of the trade agreements in a way which were amenable to the Russians and Europeans, closing tariff or tax free loopholes that worked against the Russians one sidedly, and would have not destroyed the relationships with both (not just Russia) as we have recently seen.

The three party and four party talks would have produced a lasting agreement. This did not happen, and despite popular headlines in alternative media blaming all European elites, it is only true that a large portion of the EU elites support the US plan. While they are more prominent publicly, and also have more control over media and finance, they do not decide things on their own entirely.

We do not see what does not happen, and things that do not happen do not capture headlines. What many do not understand is that Germany among others have already ruled out any NATO intervention, have ruled out further sanctions of any meaning, and has called for a ceasefire based upon the August 23rd positions, which essentially recognizes a Novorossiya with a united Lugansk and Donetsk. The 500 million euro loan is quite minimal when speaking in terms of economies of scale, and not at all close to what was needed by Ukraine. To put it in perspective, the 500 million is less than half of the cost of the interest on the loan of 15 billion from the IMF if 7%; if that was a one time simple interest and not compound interest. But make no mistake, that 500 million is also a loan too.

Conclusively, this prolonged course has given European analysts sufficient reasons to see that Ukraine is doing what is in the best interest of the US, is pursuing not its own foreign policy but rather the US’s. Additionally because this follows a coup which ultimately led to the installation through illegal elections of Poroshenko, who was revealed by the limited hangout wikileaks to be the mainn ‘star’ of the US’s ‘Our Ukraine’ program (or OU), there are increasing facts which irrefutably point both to the fact that Ukraine is presently under foreign occupation, and that Russia’s efforts thus fall under a combination of R2P and past precedents codified in Geneva Convention norms. This has been the solid position of Glazyev

2.) Allowing a victimological narrative to be developed favoring Novorossiyans based upon civilian areas being shelled and the forced exodus of innocents, including the deaths of women and children. This is the hardest thing for people sympathetic to the Russian position to understand. The shortest way to rationalize this is to understand that avoiding this would cost more lives in the future, especially since a loss for Russia in Novorossiya would be the beginning of a decade or two long process which would ultimately see destruction of the Russian Federation, but moreover the division of Russia itself into about ten mutually hostile statelettes, leading to a US backed disastrous war between them on the Eurasian continent, ultimately drawing in China and Germany, and costing between perhaps 100 million to 1 billion lives.

Russia is not a country with a border, but a civilizational mode and concept which historically has been able to expand and contract. Under conditions of late modernity and post-modern warfare, such a contraction would be unlike any in the past, and would signify a period of prolonged war and global strife of which humanity may not recover for centuries to come.

Russia’s resilience historically is rooted in being able to withstand attack, and sacrifice its own people for the collective good. This was done successfully in the Patriotic War of 1812 when Alexander I of Russia ordered the Cossacks to burn and destroy Russian villages which Napoleon had planned to support the supply line. Then of course are the 14 million Russian civilians who died as a result of the German invasion in the Great Patriotic War in the early 1940’s.

3.) Allowing a large front and ‘meat grinder’ by which the largest possible number of ultra-right wing Pravy Sektor fanatics can be sent off to die, and their organizers permanently dishonored, thus forever changing the future political landscape of Ukraine and in so doing creating the possibility of a more manageable, at least neutral to positive, smaller Ukraine space in the rump state still called ‘Ukraine’. There is still a possibility, perhaps during or after the winter, perhaps sooner, for another revolution to take place in Kiev. Not of the Pravy Sektor Majdan 2.0 initiatives we say today which are symptomatic of the larger collapse of the present Ukrainian trajectory, but a post-collapse Ukraine revolution. For it not to be thwarted or commandeered by the Pravy Sektor, they must have already been killed on the front in Novorossiya.

That is what is happening now, and so we can already say that this has had a positive impact on the future of the Ukrainian rump, whatever it shall be. The longer that there are hostilities, the more of them are permanently removed from any future equation. So far the casualty ratio is something around 20 KJ fighters for each 1 NM. With a 20 to 1 ratio, the Novorossiyans can afford to keep their meatgrinder in business and grinding.

LPR militia “Ghost” brigade commander Alexei Mozgovoy speech about what is Novorossia fighting for and how, adressed to former Donetsk and Luhansk officials who have fled UA and participate in forum dedicated to problems with building Novorossia

Putin: Ahead of the Curve

Seeing clearly that the US in the last 48 hours is trying to use Russia’s victimological narrative against it, is continuing on with the line that Russia also used which is that Novorossiya is hanging by a thread. But Russia is ready to switch gears, and has outgrown the narrative of losing. They got the most assurances that they could get from the Europeans regarding non-interference. What they got was expected given the political and economic climate in Germany. Addressing the world, Putin essentially reveals that the KJ in the south is defeated and in need of humanitarian aid. Poroshenko wants to pretend they are winning, and will let the surrounded troops all be killed if need be. Later he will accuse the dead and captured of having gone AWOL as has been consistent Ukraine policy since the start of hostilities.

Novorossiya Wins the Battle: NATO Escalation?

Though it is correct to state with some qualification that both sides in this conflict had placed much on a good result from the battle over Donetsk, the odds were on the side of the NM. This whole effort has been the NM’s to lose from the start. This much has been stated repeatedly in every relevant piece and podcast from the CSS. The economics and politics of this war, if it does not spread, in most ways point to a Russian success and has since the start. While the conflict is not close to being over, this phase’s end is in sight. The liberation of Mariupol may be the final page, or other cities may also be liberated from the KJ before either a significant NATO escalated response or capitulation. Western capitulation may come fast or slow, but we are confident that as with US failures in Syria, Iraq, or Venezuela, it will be veiled in the language of bellicosity.

NATO will likely escalate in some way. It may not be in the Ukraine theatre, it may be elsewhere in Eastern Europe or the Balkans. One strong possibility we have seen signs of is a staged escalated class and national struggle of Bosniak “workers” to marginalize the pro-Russian Serbs in B&H. It will escape the thinking of both western press and Bosniaks that the Serbs count among them also a laboring class, and also have national-liberatory aspirations. The escalation may be in Syria with the US bombing ‘IS’ holdouts in, ridiculous as it may seem, Aleppo or Damascus (where in fact Syrian forces will be struck).

The Pacific theatre may also be stoked, perhaps the US pushing upon Japan to become increasingly bellicose over symbolic islands. Chinese pressure may ramp up again over the failed Fukushima Daiichi cleanup hoax. We have also seen the early stages of an Arab Spring/Color Revolution tactic in Venezuela, but US moves are also possible in any of the so-called ‘Pink Tide’ states of Latin America.

Recall that US President Obama already effected a coup in Honduras, ousting the anti-imperialist and capitalism-skeptic government of Manuel Zalaya. Recall also that credible evidence exists that Chavez was given cancer by US agents as an oncovirus.

This escalation may never end and it can not be dismissed that WWIV is close at hand. However, the course of escalation by NATO may have disastrous blowback. If Poland is tapped to increase its role beyond allowing mercenaries to seek employment by private armies, this could lead to an implosion of the Polish political establishment and a return to the ‘Russia neutral’ type of coalition which ruled in Poland until NATO brought down the plane containing the now deceased Polish leadership in Smolensk.

And likewise, in the above listed possible theatre, blowback may ultimately lead to the collapse of the US effort. We cannot forget that world markets increasingly are minimizing their reliance on the dollar as the ‘world reserve currency’, relevant markets respond positively to Russian successes, and significant punctuated events like the creation of the BRICS New Development Bank are Brobdingnagian factors in this regard.

Thus to understand the Russian position and Grand Strategy requires some background in the metaphysics and metanarrative. Required is a discussion of both the ontological and epistemic factors particularly surrounding the information war.

The US does not want a direct conventional war with Russia; it wants to push the EU to sever its economic ties with the rest of Eurasia. If this requires a massive Europe and Eurasia war, costing the lives of many millions, but retarding the economic development of both spheres by decades, then their aims have been met. Otherwise the tendency of the economic and cultural development for Eurasia to develop along a parallel and ultimately singular trajectory with Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok.

What has frustrated the Eurasian effort?

As we have covered, this development is a natural and historic trend which the US and its imperial predecessor, the UK, had kept from becoming a reality. It has done this for 100 years. During the cold war the Russian difficulty was both geostrategic but ideological, and could not bring Europe into a larger economic development zone spanning from Lisbon to Vladivostok.

That would have required the 1.) peace-movement to have succeeded, but instead was thwarted by the escalation of cold war rhetoric and neo-liberal economic policies in the 1980’s, and the rise of the Reagan-Thatcher axis. It may have before required 2.) an electoral success of communist and socialist parties in Western Europe; but the continued success of Trotskyism, Maoism, Social-Democracy, and anti-Stalinism in general split apart the communist support for the Russian initiative. Initially it had gambled upon 3.) the spread of pro-Soviet worker’s revolutions, but the problems on what Marxists called the ‘superstructural level’ confounded those efforts even where the ‘objective conditions existed’; hence giving rise to Gramsci’s theory of ‘hegemony’ (expanding upon on Lenin’s theory of ‘false consciousness’) and in some way also the general rise of the so-called Frankfurt School ‘cultural Marxists’.

The Russians worked their plan from ‘3‘, and after the failure of ‘1‘ realized they would have to pursue another line. From 3 to 1, each contingency marked a profound deescalation. Thus a new plan was hatched.

This plan we are all now familiar with – rather than changing the European political sphere to make it compatible with the Eurasian, they aimed to change the Eurasian to be compatible with the European. This integration into the Europe of markets and republicanism was also the European integration into Eurasia. It was much more complicated than this however, and the betrayals of Gorbachev and the group around Yeltsin were real. The destruction of much of Eurasian society by the oligarch criminals was also an actual phenomenon. These were necessary to endure, and there was no guarantee that the hermetically sealed deep-state which found leadership in Putin would be able to re-emerge as the state itself. The simulacrum of defeat was holographically projected over every real sign of an actual defeat.

To understand on the macro level the use of simulacrum, with whole broad historical periods as narratives appearing as something other than what they were, is to give us a key insight into how this synthetic reality is manufactured on the micro level of the news cycle, as it revolves around a context specific phenomenon exemplified within the conflict in the former Ukraine.

Stagecraft, Simulacrum, Holograph

From this we view that our discussion forwardly centers around the Russian use of synthetic reality, while different than the West’s version as descried through consumerism and the entertainment industrial complex, is generally also based upon the sciences of cognition and social psychology.

Beyond that which we ourselves can experience through the five senses, there are several layers of cognition required for the human mind to assign an order, reason, understanding of an event or phenomenon which we come to understand through presented accounts.

When we rely on presented accounts, and without a simultaneously running cognitive process which filters all presented information with the aim of understanding the simulacrum itself, we become ensnared in the simulacrum by its planners. This phenomenon partly explains why those reporting and analyzing the Novorossiyan initiative have been unable to read this script.

The larger synthetic bubble which encapsulates not only the minds of the people and its leaders, but the functioning of the entire modern western civilizational project, is itself liberalism. It has both a pre-modern, modern, and post-modern form. But in speaking of liberalism we do not mean the theory, but the reality as internalized through the cognitive processes of its subjects. It is an entire schema, with its own weltanschauung.

Liberalism’s view of epistemic matters is greatly lacking and involves a process of double-think. On the one hand it suffers from a naive skepticism with regard to both epistemic and ontological matters, and tends towards a Popperian ‘critical rationalist’ view of the sciences and cognition. Yet it is neither critical nor rational, but rather reasonable. Reasonableness is an emotional state like anger or infatuation, and like anger or infatuation is blinding in that it clouds judgment.

Like anger feeling like ‘righteousness’, or infatuation feeling like ‘genuine need’, reasonableness feels like ‘being rational’. The blinding nature of reasonableness is that it lulls the subject into believing that their thoughts and subsequent actions have been blessed by the gods of rationality. Much of the British Empire after the Enlightenment was justified by the sense of ‘reasonableness’ held by its leaders and supporters.

On the other hand it largely takes for granted the wrong view that the synthetic bubble surrounding their manufactured environment is entirely natural. The western simulacrum is based upon liberalism, but to use such a word is not entirely descriptive by itself. More to the point, like much of democratic theory, it is based somewhat on giving individuals various doses of narcissistic supply, flattering them by telling them that all what they see is theirs and that all what they have is real. It informs them that they, without putting tremendous work or directing their skepticism in the right direction, are already equipped to understand the world as presented.

Rather, the liberal individual is encouraged to direct his skepticism at those who are skeptical of the entire schema, and those real skeptics are called ‘cynics’. But the world as presented to them is a manufactured holographic program which the ruling class has built (and inherited) using all spheres of media, education, ideology, ‘common sense’, and so-called civil society. Thus the totalitarian myth of pluralism proceeds from that cognitive error, and can only understand itself through its own language – which is no way to understand something thoroughly, at all.

Once ensnared in the spectacle of the simulacrum, the observer experiences a number of realizations, thoughts, and conclusions which were generally partly arranged by the planner. They are experienced on every level as their own thoughts and conclusions, and they cannot distinguishing between ‘why’ they think and ‘how’ they think something is. In Freudian terms, while far from perfect, we can understand that in the liberal mind the super-ego and the id have fused into one, or perhaps it is the id parading as the super-ego; it is a base rooted animalistic desire to sit upon the pedestal as moral judge and jury. Actually being right may be an objective or intersubjective matter, but wanting to be right is a base instinct likely rooted in human evolution and animalistic hierarchy.

In the process of waking from a dream, we often hear a sound which is being produced from our non-dream reality, but in the dream it is coming from some source in the dream story. Strangely upon waking we realize that this sound has just started to happen – a car horn, garbage truck, alarm clock, telephone. But in the dream this sound originated farther back in the story, minutes or hours before within the dreamer’s experience of time. It is also a different sound, and as all sounds are hallucinations on some level, is interpreted as another sound. The real phone ringing in the dream is a bird or a song or words from a person, etc.

What we understand from this is that the cognitive process exists in time, but does not give us a real sense of linear time. The experience of linear time in cognition is not the same as the actual external world of sequential cause and effect. Rather the cognitive process in real time can assign to the consciousness an atemporal or anachronistic experience. Our experience of sequence and the actual sequence are not united nor unilaterally determined. Also revealed are that it is our minds that do the hearing, not our ears.

The dream experience of sounds, sights, and time is much more like our waking cognitive experience. We see and hear things we expect to see and hear, even to the point of misjudging or mischaracterizing the actual things we are seeing and hearing. And so we can extrapolate from this that cognitive processes and our even our very sense of self both mirrors and is ensnared within the entire schema of the subject’s society.

Therefore, in understanding the holographic reality, we can see the ‘Ukraine vs. Novorossiya’ phenomenon as something simultaneously real and yet at the same time projected over. It is a reality, a dream, and a holographic projection all at once. The way we remember events and their significance, and the actual order and meaning they had when they occurred are not the same.

Many people are intelligent and suspect that something is wrong with the false narrative of Novorossiyan events being projected through news and information sources, and others take it further and understand somewhere deep inside that something is wrong with the entire western materialist and consumerist paradigm. When intelligent people receive obviously wrong information, they underestimate the ability of others to understand that it is obviously wrong information. Thus the official, though obviously wrong, view becomes assigned in their mind’s cabinet as not only the official view, but probably also what ‘everyone else’ thinks, and as such – as social beings – becomes the ‘polite view’. It is also the reasonable view, or at least in politely examining the official view they would like to remain in the reasonable emotive state.

Thus much of the liberal simulacrum is held together by good people not wanting to offend, and thoughtful people wanting to be rational. Among others, reasonableness is the emotive state used in liberalism to justify hierarchies – the more reasonable, the higher the status. So it is produced together: 1.) reasonableness-as-morality, 2.) conformity, 3.) submission. The simulacrum however projects over those three productions the following emotional states: 1.) rationalism 2.) individualism 3.) freedom.

The Russian planners and thinkers who work in this realm of cognitive science have been working closely to inform Putin and is advisers. They understand the above set of complex relations between actual reality, thinking, and projected reality, and understand the way the western liberal mind functions, and how it interacts with the news cycle. Most of these experts were of adult age when the USSR still existed, and Soviet society, while ultimately destroyed by liberalism, was not a liberal society. It’s entire schema was different, and produced a different – though still modern – weltanschauung.

These factors help to us understand why these men and women do so well what they do. They now live in a variation of the simulacrum of the liberal form of modernity, forcibly imposed onto the former Soviet Union, but they did not come of age in it. Because of the pre-90’s experiences of today’s leadership, among them are the living memories of a different society that had a different schema. Thus not only are they aware that another schema is possible in the abstract, they actually originate from one that was different and have that real life experience. Russia is still a combination of pre-modern and modern society, with the technologies and foreign memetic influences of western post-modernity often projected over it. Russia, in a manner similar to that described by H. Marcuse in ‘One Dimensional Man‘, (or Pan-Arabists like Michel Aflaq) has it is disposal the possibility of diverging from the modernist western course and either returning to or creating for itself an entirely separate civilizational direction and course sui generis. This would also have the effect of promoting global diversity and multi-polarity.

Now that we have explored some of the theories of cognition which help to understand the simulacrum, we can present a general overview of the specific tactics which the Russian leadership are presently employing in order to manage the perception and actual experience of reality.

The General Propaganda Strategy: Turn the Opponents Lies into Truths and Vice Versa

Tactics:

1.) Utilize the ‘truth is in the middle’ cognitive fallacy

2.) Employ the ‘agreement of opposed interests equals truth’ fallacy

3.) Exploit ‘reports from the field’ fallacy

4.) Expose and Confront Hoaxes and False Flags

The Russians have followed their plan in playing the western news cycle and media game. They have also demonstrated a profound understanding of the machinations of the liberal mind as it grapples to rationalize news and information. While a majority of people are aware that official news and information is erroneous, this does not mean that news consumers do not have some ‘system’ of understanding and working through information which may be faulty. Two methods normally used: “the truth is somewhere in the middle” (a common fallacy) alongside: “if both sides claim it, it’s probably true” (another common fallacy).

1.) Prior to the aid convoy, the Russians have publicly claimed, using plausible deniability, that they are not at all involved formally in the Ukraine conflict. The Ukrainians and much of the far west has claimed that the Russians are entirely involved. The liberal mind takes these two conflicting accounts and assumes that the Russians are probably involved in some way, but not extensively: “the truth is somewhere in the middle”. Of course most liberals are supporters of the western project, but there are also left-liberal ‘fellow travelers’ and ‘conservative’ liberals who have concerns about ‘liberalism’, in the realm of anti-imperialism or ‘traditionalism’ (not Guenon), respectively, and are sympathetic to Russia.

These left-liberal and right-liberal fellow travelers have been prone to ‘lash out’ at the Russian state and Putin for not being involved enough. The more loudly they do this, the more they help create the simulacrum – echoed now on several sides – that the Russians are insufficiently involved. We already covered the strengths and problems of this when alternative media overestimates the scope or nature of their audience, and affects the wrong audience in Analysis of July 5 Slaviansk Developments

We wrote then:

The underlying belief that one takes from this line is that Russia is not formally involved. This noble lie allows Russia’s allies in Europe to place more pressure on media, public and on the pro-NATO side of Europe (inner politics) and increase the fissure between the EU Atlanticists and the growing EU crypto-Eurasianists. But when criticism of Russia is directed at pro-Russian population in Ukraine, it can have a demoralizing effect. But of course what is more demoralizing is the shelling of civilian populations.

It can also confuse those on the fence; but at the same time the popular opinion of the majority of people are only significant in their relationship to shifting the mainstream view within a select audience of certain nations. For example: popular opinion in the US and England are much less relevant than that of Germany, Poland, etc. Actual NM commanders and leaders like Gubarev and Strelkov are clear that the movements of militia out of Slavyansk are of tactical significance and not significant of ‘defeat’.

2.) Both sides, for different reasons, claimed that the KJ was winning and that the NM was losing. Because of this apparent agreement of the condition, the liberal mind is prone to believe it to be true. Just as ‘the truth is in the middle’ (and not at either extreme, or moreover, somewhere else entirely) in cases where there is disagreement, the Russians also understood the western predilection for believing that agreement on a thing by otherwise opposed sides means that the thing is true. This was manipulated for several purposes, as previously covered.

Contrary to the simulated reality, Russia was deeply involved and always was, even before the beginning – Donbas Republic movement was supported by the Eurasian movement for many years in the last decade, involving ‘far right’ and ‘far left’ groups such as Varyag, RNU, ESM, EoT, KPU radicals, and others.

In actuality Russia manipulated the west’s need to report victories – especially the Kiev Junta – and rather than stating the opposite (leading the liberal mind to conclude a stalemate, part of the western disinfo plan), instead agreed. This allowed the entire humanitarian crisis narrative to be more audible and credible, and created general sympathy for the Russian position among at least target European audiences. The west then tried to generate its own synthetic ‘stalemate’ narrative where hoped for conflicting Russian claims were lacking. Because the intended audience generally believes that ‘the truth is in the middle’, generally the Russian narrative tended to push the ‘limited engagement’ idea in the western mind towards the ‘limited’ end of the spectrum and away from ‘engagement’ end.

3.a) Mao once famously said ‘Defeat after defeat until final Victory’, and such an inspiring expression might otherwise be used to describe the general sense among NM fighters. Reports from the field buttressed this sense. Except that on the operational and command level, such was not really the case. For intelligence and morale reasons, it was important for NM fighters to to have an alternate narrative which was based in the ‘limited engagement’ narrative regarding Russian involvement.

In actual fact, NM fighters understanding the control over the events which the Russians had, could lead to possible morale and cohesiveness issues. We will leave aside here the issue of the necessary spectacle of the Novorossiya revolution being autochthonic, though this is also a factor. Primarily, being unable to divorce their innate human desire to save the Donbas people from the KJ’s punitive shelling of civilians and subsequent ‘lustration’ and conscription while under hostile occupation, knowledge that the Russians were allowing this to happen – though necessary – in order to create both European sympathy and to justify the movement into the pre-planned defensible positions, may not have been morally acceptable even though operationally, tactically, and strategically necessary. In reality, the movement from Slaviansk, as we previously clarified, was not the abandonment of a position, but the end of a strategic operation which gave the time needed for the real consolidation of the NM positions seen on the week of August 4th. It also produced the necessary amount of contrived concern which led ultimately to the consolidation of the various NM’s into something of a NAF under the central command of Zakharchenko.

In the piece Novorossiya: The Propaganda War – Methods and Framework, we attempted to explain how the information war is used in Fourth Generation Warfare – 4GW – alongside of 3GW methods developed in past conflicts. We were right in previously pointing to the fact that KJ defeats on the Novorossiyan front would lead to further and sharpened divisions in Kiev. They also created space for further uprisings needed in places like Kharkov and Odessa. In that piece we explained that:

Reports from the front should continue that the situation is bad and without good supplies. NM soldiers in the field must be inoculated from such propaganda as it ramps up. They will be told what to expect from their commanding officers, and will rely more on that trust than the various and conflicting reports coming through the internet and MSM. Units will be held together by the charisma of the immediate officer, and the positive development of the growing cult of personality around Strelkov and Gubarev.

Reports of weakness are used in the following way: It entices the Kiev Junta (KJ) to attack insufficiently and prematurely, or cause delays based in false confidence which results in delays in following up on actions. Those delays give time for NM to take further initiative. Resulting defeats of KJ on increasingly significant scale while Russia is maintaining sufficient relations with EU bring the pragmatists over to the now newly realized practical approach – support for further escalation of the pressure on the Junta in general.

Leaving aside that it can be seen in retrospect that our summary and prognoses from months prior have come into fruition; reporting and coverage of war leaves much to be desired, and much of the information creates epistemic disorder. This is because it is ‘data’, it creates the wrong impression of knowledge development in the area: misinformation and disinformation are worse than no information. Even when the subject is aware that information is faulty or contains errors, the cognitive processes of the mind, (which inherently involves faulty reasoning and can be based on impressions made on the subconscious level) allows the subject to understand on the intellectual level that information is untrustworthy while on level of the subconscious in fact falls ‘victim’ to the intended epistemic disorder.

The Russian tactic will change now, and will for the time being allow more of the real facts to emerge that the NM is winning. Its victories are such that they are becoming impossible to hide. The 280+ humanitarian trucks were the last page of the last chapter which told the tale of losing. The page has been turned now. Still, the Russians will probably send more aid in another convoy.

3.b) One must also include a brief review of a part of this ‘reports of losing’ tactic which we have pointed out on our social networking interface when asked. Supporters of the NM had been misled by Russian propaganda numerous times. The pattern that was observable to CSS as far back as May 1st was this: Russia would engage in some maneuvers which it would either leak or allow to be spun unchallenged as being indicative of a possible Russian capitulation. Then, at the critical moment, Russia and Novorossiya emerged with the upper hand. There are more examples of this available than at the moment of this publishing, but we implore the reader to recall at least the following:

I.) The slaughter at Odessa leaves more than 50 dead. Before May 11th, on May 7th Putin asked the Donetsk and Lugansk people to not hold the election. There was question as to whether it would be held, and Russia allowed unchallenged the idea to be spread that it was looking to cut a deal that recognizes Crimea. What was forgotten is that Europe already essentially okay’d the Crimean referendum and the expansion of the Russian border. Reporting indicated Russian weakness, but then after May 11th it was clear that the referendum’s happened anyways. Nevertheless, we heard then that the sky was falling.

Russia surprises with strength: Very professional looking ‘volunteers’ popped up in the two break-away oblasts, as well as other factors including the actual personalities leading DPR and LPR, and it was clear to those following that there was some increasing degree of actual Russian support.

II.) From May 11 forward through the 19th, there was question as to whether Putin and the Duma would take up the question of ascension into the Russian federation, per the request of the PM’s of Donetsk and Lugansk. The fact that he did not was taken once again as a sign of capitulation in the face of Kiev’s threatening to start the ATO. Word was that Putin would capitulate in the face of the threatened ATO. Then Russia on May 19th pulled back from the border, signaling capitulation once again. June 3rd, NATO indicates its willing to help Ukraine. We heard again that the sky was falling.

Then Russia surprises with Strength the Duma created a ‘super NGO’ charged with the coordination and supervision of all the major NGO’s involved in bringing in both ‘defensive’ military and humanitarian supplies to the DPR and LPR, mostly through Rostov. June 4th, rebels take two more bases in Lugansk.

III.) June 13th, KJ takes Mariupol, the rest of the month fighting seems like attrition, and ultimately on June 25th the Duma revokes Putin’s authorization to use soldiers in Ukraine. Then on the 27th, Ukraine signs the association agreement with the EU. July 5th, the NM leaves Slaviansk. The sky has definitely fallen.

Russia shows Strength: July 13th through Putin goes to Cuba, forgives the debt. July 14th, NM takes down a large transport plane killing 50 or so KJ fighters.

IV.) July 17th US and Ukraine take down the Malaysian plane over Novorossiya, attempt to pin it on Russia. The situation looks bad for Russia

Russia shows strength, the same day proceeds to sign the BRICS New Development Bank deal with $50 billion start up capital. Proceeds to hand over all intel on the plane to European and Malaysian authorities, holds a press conference showing that a fighter was in the sky behind the Malaysian flight, and that the NM did not have a Buk system in place. US still has not offered any evidence of NM or Russian involvement in the downing.

V.) July 30th – The EU and US announce new sanctions against Russia, focussing on Russia’s oil sector, defense equipment and sensitive technologies.

August 3rd – Ukrainian forces claim to have surrounded the city of Lugansk. The city’s supplies of power and water supplies run low and communications are down.

August 5th, Donetsk surrounded. Situation critical

Russia shows strength – Putin hits back against Western sanctions, with a “full embargo” on fruit, vegetables, meat, fish, milk and dairy imports. Affected European countries begin to pressure Brussels to roll back the sanctions.

VI.) Throughmid August -Western reports that NM in Donetsk are fleeing positions. All hope is lost

Russia shows strength – Mid August onward – first cauldron, border with Russia finally secured. August 22nd almost 300 humanitarian aid trucks roll into Novorossiya. The tide changes. That same week the cauldrons consume 6 whole brigades, KJ likely loses 4 to 5 thousand fighters in several days of fighting and operations.

This had been the pattern, it was detectable early on. This was the model we used to understand reporting. At every juncture, the same people were taken in by the western media spectacle again and again. Even though the pattern and tactic was obvious, people following western media reporting were largely unaware of each showing of strength and resilience which followed the feigned set back. Western and liberal audiences only were exposed to or retained the news of setbacks.

Thus, the obvious and steady Russian and Novorossiyan victories, whether in Ukraine or on the global stage, were forgotten or not understood in proper context. This meant that when the massive cauldron victories went public, those same people were stunned and ‘Astounded’. Herein lies the essence of the ‘astounding’ Novorossiyan Victories. They were obvious and expected.

The post July 5th positions taken by the NM were not random, arbitrary, or forced by circumstances resembling defeat or capitulation. These were the best positions in the theatre to occupy. By mid July it was obvious that the KJ was engaged in a series of uncoordinated attacks. As we mentioned on July 6th in our article then, it was important to keep the July 5th ‘fall’ of Slaviansk in perspective.

Basic Military Principle: “Do not confuse strategic removal for the loss of a position.” Attention must be given to the 4th generation warfare where real-time information, shared by our own friends and supporters can be used to demoralize our camp […] In three months of low to medium intensity fighting, where popular Novorossiya militias (NM) have had to defend known positions, the KJ has gathered all its available might and resources in order to ‘displace’ (more on that in the below) parts of the NM from one small city with a population of about 130,000. It is necessary to reflect on the significance of that fact alone, and what it says about the inability of the KJ to project power.

The real signifier of the then coming punctuation was the US July failure to control the narrative of the now exposed hoax/false flag of the Malaysian plane downing. Western media has gone entirely silent on this issue, and the Malaysian government has stated publicly that Russia was definitively not the culprit.

Strelkov took the further initiative of inoculating the public from another use of this tactic by the US in forewarning its use again, this time regarding a chemical plant. If this was actually planned, then Strelkov’s exposure was also preventative.

The US was relying upon the success of this tactic; its failure led to the consolidation of the preferred and pre-planned operational positions which essentially summarize the events of August. The US’s strategies are often easy to unravel for reasons we have previously explored, and thus the US relies on the ‘Power of Crazy’. We used this term partly to have resonate an otherwise banal description of the ‘stochastic outcomes’ (Osborne and Rubinstein) game within a game theory based on non-cooperative zero-sum games.

Game Theory: Zero Sum Game and the Thalassocratic Power

Generally the telluric power engages its soft border neighbors on the basis of positive sum, but the thalassocratic tends engage its would be colonies on the basis of hybrid (blend of zero and positive) or zero sum, and mostly engages the telluric on the basis of zero sum, which in the case of the latter ultimately leads to prolonged conflict, war, and perhaps an infinitely long game.

Standing above strategy are positions, and as such von Neumann equilibria allows planners to formalize (operationalize and quantify) the relevant factors involved in strategic planning as the positions are known. There are a limited set of strategies that can be employed to arrive at a desired position. But if that position is not known, then the set of possible strategies increases exponentially. The goal of the US is to disrupt Russian ability to quantify US long-term goals (positions) into the usable theoretical models which is the formalization process.

The known position desired or held can give away the strategy, and the strategy used can give away the position desired or real position held, but in general strategy the aim is to deceive and avoid. Thus adding unpredictable and random events into the mix makes it much more difficult. Fortunately, with the advent of computers it is possible to formalize a model based upon Markov’s decision process.

In a sense this ‘Power of Crazy’ acts much the same as ‘acts of God’ or ‘acts of nature’ as described in stochastic outcomes game, where the unknown ‘x’ factor makes the standard von Neumann zero sum equilibria difficult to formalize.

The Malaysian Plane incident was the first time in the 21st century that the US attempted to frame the Russians for an atrocity against civilians, and it was also the first time, perhaps in history, that Russia publicly exposed a standard US hoax/false flag. The long term ramifications of this are still unknown, but we may speculate that the manner in which the US and UK official press essentially made an about face and ‘came forward’ with the James Foley beheading hoax was not only historically unprecedented but perhaps connected to Russian work behind the scenes.

Much More than ‘Plan A’ vs. ‘Plan B’: Contingencies Cubed

The state of economics and mathematical science of war is such: almost every possible situation, battlefield, theatre – whether optimal, sub-optimal, pessimal – is planned for and around at every level. At every decision point mapped out along the way is planned at minimum a half dozen of contingencies (much more complex than ‘plan A vs plan B’). To emphasize, there are not only more than a half dozen contingencies built into the general strategy (supporting a given position) but rather this is multiplied exponentially. For every possible situation requiring a modification of, implementation of ‘tactic’, there are developed a half dozen contingencies.

Thus, there are scores of contingent plans with scores of contingencies built into each contingent plan. Through this lens, the tremendous industrial and bureaucratic effort of war can be better appreciated. This is performed years in advance, and of course when the real situations emerge they play out in ways which may combinations of any of the variable situations, and therefore rely on another set of skills. Those combinations are not always predictable in full detail.

This is entirely commensurate with the teachings of Sun Tsu in the Art of War – 1.) the outcome of a war must be known before it begins. Those not knowing the outcome are those likely to lose it.

Also connected to understanding Russia’s grand strategy: 2.) To win a position without using force is better than to win a position with using force.

Russians are also following the maxim: “he who excels in defeating his enemies triumphs before his enemy’s threats become real”.

Positioning is also critical, which can help us explain the present position of the NM in its overall bleeding-defensive strategy. The decision to position an army must be based on both objective conditions in the physical environment and the subjective beliefs of other, competitive actors in that environment.

However, while Art of War is still studied in most military academies around the world, it is by no means the final word. The changes in warfare which alter the way this work should be understood have been significant. For Sun Tsu strategy was not planning in the sense of working through a set of contingencies, but rather were quick responses to changing conditions. Though planning works in a controlled environment, in a changing environment competing plans collide which create unforeseeable new situations. Technical progress has moved in two directions simultaneously, but tend to favor the utility of contingencies; while war is faster in terms of involving rockets, jets, the motorized cavalry ‘blitzkrieg’ and ‘shock and awe’, information and data analysis technologies have evolved even further and are even faster in comparison. But more to the point, it is important to distinguish between general strategies and ‘quick responses to changing conditions’, which ought to better be understood as ‘tactics’: tactics being employed on the fly in sub-optimal conditions in order to pursue a given general strategy.

War is a microcosm of life itself, and everything which can characterize life itself is intensified and pronounced through war. Life is struggle – the class struggle, the national struggle, historical struggle, existential struggle, internal struggle, spiritual struggle. War is life’s struggle unleashed. Thus many things in life as in war which appear as incidental, arbitrary, random, coincidental, unplanned, mysterious, surprising, and unknown are not – rather they are the opposite.

Indeed they are foreseeable, mitigated, planned around, planned for, required, caused, effected, affected, and expected. In 4GW all of the of the technical, scientific, and humanities sciences are brought together syncretically; the generalist brings together the master specialist and must as well himself be highly proficient as a specialist in each of the areas he coordinates.

Novorossiya: “Losing” Until Victory

In connection with the socialist and nationalist revolution and war taking place today in Novorossiya, we can better sketch out how our hypothesis of the Russian Grand Strategy has been confirmed by each batch of new facts.

From the start the Novorossiyan, or more correctly the Russian, strategy has been to manipulate several prominent factors of the way the NATO powers generate news and public information as we discussed in greater detail in sections above.

To recap, the first is that western news agencies are eager to make the Ukrainians appear to be doing well, and are always willing to make Putin seem unpopular, scheming, conniving, and uncommitted to the Novorossiyan efforts. They are eager to create the false view that Putin’s days are limited and that public discontent is high. They were also eager to create the sense among their readers that the NM was on its last leg and hanging by a thread. As we explained, the NM’s published version of Situation Reports (usually from Strelkov) exploited this tendency, and so the NM also reported that their position was weak.

The 6th Column also can be brought out of the woodwork this way; once the belief that the position is weak is promoted, the 6th column are first to jump at the opportunity to begin ‘suing for peace’. Like starving a tapeworm, once their head emerges, the whole body can be pulled out and disposed of.

But the 6th column works both ways. Recall that in the first weeks of the conflict, whole groupments were sent by Kiev to fight the NM, but instead either surrendered their equipment or even switched sides. This happened at the level of ground command, and even the navy switched sides when Crimea went over. Fears still abound that many KJ officers are traitors within the rank and file. The Ukrainian army cannot explain the rapid speed and efficiency with which the NM advances, knowing when and how to be at the right place at the right time. FSB assets in the SBU are probably numerous and placed high up.

As we have also been clear about, Kharkov in the north of Novorossiya and Odessa in the west are critical. When rumblings of partisan/rebel action in these areas was reported, we consistently reminded our friends and readers that this was a necessary part of a larger plan. Previously we had formulated, before the use of the cauldrons maneuver three or four times over in the south of Novorossiya, that the efforts would need to spark in Transdniestra supporting Odessa, and Kharkov almost simultaneously in order to draw the KJ away from the then encirclement around Donetsk. It is not clear now whether this will be necessary.

However, what will be necessary in Kharkov is the ‘communist’ angle. Kharkov is not majority ethnic-Russian, but it does have a sizable pro-Russian population if the alternative is Banderism, because they have a large Communist Party membership in this oblast. This is also true of Odessa. While located on opposite ends of the former Ukraine, these after Mariupol may be the next major targets.

Conclusion

It is clear that the methods of propaganda and messaging are decipherable, and can be understood by the attentive analyst. It is not necessary to remain neutral about the desired outcome for this conflict, but it is necessary to remain objective in analyzing and reporting on the developments. If many sympathetic to the Novorossiyan initiative were unnecessarily pessimistic about the developments, this may be in part because they listened to Eurasian and NATO propaganda which, for differing reasons, both exaggerated the extent of Novorossiyan losses. Social psychology, classical military strategy, criminology, textual induction and inference of media, and game theory in the field of Geopolitics and International Relations can be formed into a larger syncretic field which is interdisciplinary in nature and provides a good framework for understanding complex phenomenon such as the war in Ukraine and Novorossiya.

28 thoughts on “Understanding the Astounding Novorossiyan Victories”

Incredible. I am glad this situation is so good, it is what I was hoping for, but didn’t have any information to know. One thing you will learn if you read Sun Tsu, or any great philosopher or military thinker. If you are smart you will already KNOW by having figured it out on your own whatever they came up with. Never knew Mao said, keep losing until you win. But, that isn’t that hard to figure out if you are clever.

You are discussing these affairs at a transcendental level of mind, which I appreciate. While your mind is working in a somewhat different direction from my own, I see some common points of perception. For example, you said, “Once ensnared in the spectacle of the simulacrum, the observer experiences a number of realizations, thoughts, and conclusions which were generally partly arranged by the planner. They are experienced on every level as their own thoughts and conclusions …”

I have my own theory of this persuasive phenomenon, whether we call it propaganda, lying, mesmerization or hypnosis. What the planner does is like building a road. Through an elusive mix of information and disinformation, the planner defines the edges of the road, and the unsuspecting observer follows the center of the road. Since he is following the center of the road, he thinks his position is balanced. And since it is balanced, it must be objective. Moreover, since he is folowing the center of the road rather than drifting to its fanatical edges, he thinks he is choosing is own thoughts.

The real thinker turns perpedicular to the road and explores the terrain cross-country.

You’ve used another analogy to describe essentially the same thing. Thank you for reading and understanding this piece. I really appreciate that. In working out this idea, I also had to consider the following – what if the road has no edges, and what about when there are ‘two’ planners with divergent agendas? In the case of a road with no edges, I mean this – both planners with divergent agendas may create the sense of the same ‘edge’, with no space in between it. This is intended to create unanimity. This feeds into the ‘both side agree, therefore true’.

This is slightly different from two different narratives, in that case with the intention of the traveler finding some space in between, thinking he is choosing his own thoughts.

In the case of divergent agents faking unanimity I have attempted to sketch out that process.

Greetings, Joaquin, and thanks for being who you are. At some time in the future–unless you deem this as inappropriate, too limiting, incorrect–I would be happy to see an analysis, by you, of the role of white supremacy as possibly an important ideological basis that shapes the perception, as well as the focus and goals, of the imperialists/atlantacists/anglo-saxons.

Of course, I assume that you realize that when I use the term “white supremacists,” I’m not talking about Skin Heads, Ku Klux Klan members, or Neo-Nazis. I am talking about the unwritten, un-admitted, “hidden” (to most, anyway) force that, in my opinion, has existed for hundreds of years, although some of the Afro-centrists would have us believe that this phenomenon has existed for 6,000 years (e.g., Dr. Chancellor Williams’ work, The Destruction of the Black Civilization).

Also, when I say “white supremacy,” I do not mean white supremacy as opposed to black nostalgic self-indulgence regarding the resurrection of the ancient “Kemetic” past. (If I sound cynical, it’s only because I once shared that vision, as a young man, but not any longer). What I mean by white supremacy is the dominance of “white” people over all non-“white” people on this planet.

I am reminded of the class piece, written by the Harvard-based historian Dr. Lothrop Stoddard, in 1920, entitled, “The Rising Tide of Color against White World Supremacy,” which can be read online for free. It’s an important piece, because it demolishes the perception, in some circles, that white supremacy has no geo-political depth, but is only an “emotional” ideology of that class of “whites” known as “poor white trash.”

I think that when the term “western civilization” is used, amongst “whites,” it is actually a code expression that hides the subconscious idea of white supremacy. If you look at what’s happening today, everything non-white is being attacked–INCLUDING RUSSIA, which, I was once told by a friend, high-level U.S. military officers do not consider a “white” country. I was told that they consider Russians to be “mongrels,” and truly hate the Russians for not “getting on board” with the long-standing goal of white supremacy: to rid the world [physically] of non-whites.

You might be surprised to hear that, in the black barber shops, pool halls, and other such places, Russia was very much respected, if not loved. When Russia fell, the discussion in the black barbershops went along these lines: “Awwwwww, SHIT!! You KNOW we in trouble NOW!! As long as Russia kept these white folks busy, WE were safe!”

My auntee worked for Al Capone, the famous 1920s gangster. She told me that, back in the 1920s, there were only three places that black folk could obtain monetary loans:

1. The Black Church
2. The Mafia
3. The Communist Party.

There was a great love for the Soviet Union, in the black community, but it was kept “on the quiet,” in large part for safety sake [Can’t be making these “white” folks angry!!??]

Well, I’m diverging. I apologize. I have not finished reading your article. I’m half-way through it. Maybe you deal with this topic of white supremacy in the article. I’ll finish it today.

Anyway, again, it would be very interesting to get your take on the deeper influences of white supremacy, if you believe that any such deep influences exist. I sometimes think that white supremacy is the biggest goal of the imperialists, although other people think that the global situation is being conducted by “the Jews,” or by the “one percent.” Maybe it’s some kind of unholy alliance between the three.

Hi Joaquin, great to have you back. It’s about time.
I heard some really important news. I urge all of you to listen to Jim Willie’s recent breaking news at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tgOUazLGdhc&list=UUx-BKQDYIzUveyfi9nd6ZlQ. What he is saying from his excellent sources is that battle hardened veterans from various countries in western Europe including France are fighting on the side of the eastern Ukrainians and are actually providing some of the leadership to them. These are professional soldiers who are against what the elite bankers, politicians and NATO atlantacists are doing in providing support to the god awful nazis in Kiev. These are not mercenaries and they are fighting out of true committment. So this is looking a lot like the international brigades who came to the defense of the Spanish Republic against the Hitler supported Franco forces. But I guarantee this time, unlike the unsuccessful effort in Spain, the anti fascists will be victorious. Don’t forget they have the powerful Russian military at their back, however stealth like they are. This means, according to Jim Willie, that NATO could be in its death throes because there must be many military people who sympathize with the Lugansk and Donetsk patriots in the NATO countries and that’s why both the Kiev regime and NATO itself are truly in panic mode. Maybe the survival of NATO is dependent on the survival of the Kiev stooges and that accounts for the hysterical, vitriolic and plainly stupid Rossophobic statements by the western elite. I mean they’re grasping for any straws that they can. I think if any crackpot says that Russia killed Jesus, Russia caused the flood during Noah’s Arc, Russia caused the Black Plague, Russia is causing the solar flares and Russia caused the Ice Age the western newsmen will put that out as fact. I think a lot of people are seeing through this and apparently lots of professional veterans in the west are too.

On another note there is a major split developing and really intensifying between the Nazi supporters-western elite and the businessmen, farmers and industrialists. The sanctions are really hurting many businesses and the owners are fuming mad. So maybe besides NATO splitting you may see the EU do the same. Germany is the key country in all of this. They have two choices, go down the drain in supporting NATO and the EU or flourish in alliance with Russia and China. The tension between these two choices will get unbearable.

And this is exactly why Russia didn’t want to liberate the eastern provinces directly. If they would have done this then you wouldn’t have seen the splits in western Europe and, more importantly, you wouldn’t have seen this growing anti fascist international military aid that is coming to eastern Ukraine. By Russia not intervening directly they have let nature take its course. Out of the victory of the anti fascists will come wonderful things. I think we’re on the cusp of world chaning events and all to the better.

Just enjoy Fogh, Cameron, McCain, Obama and company squirm in agony when their little pip squeak stooges like Yats, Kolomoisky and Poroshenko have to run for the hills. It’ll be fun to watch.

Very well stated I would add a few things. The Russians let the New Russians get bombed for awhile because now they are pissed, they aren’t just going to defend their homeland they will march on Kiev, whether the Russians tell them to or not. If Russia makes an attack on a NATO country this will splinter the alliance if is doesn’t fall apart before that. The Germans only have 18,000 combat troops, Poland has 12,000. The New Russian Militia now numbers more than that. They are battle hardened and ready to kick some ass. Kiev’s days are numbered.

This is such great news!! I believe that the fall of NATO began with its DEFEAT in Libya. It did not meet its goals, according to its own assessment at CIA headquarters in Langley, if we’re to believe a report by DEBKAfile. This cartoon perfectly depicted what happened to NATO in Libya:

The LDF (Libyan Defense forces) were mounting such a tremendous defense and offense against NATO, taqfiris, jihadists, terrorists and mercenaries that U.S. generals were astounded, and were publicly stating that they “could not understand” how the LDF was able to hold off attacks for some 9 months.

At NATO’s self-assessment meeting, at CIA headquarters, they concluded the following:

1. NATO’s performance in Libya was “pathetic.”
2. NATO’s performance in Libya was “ineffectual.”
3. NATO would not be able to mount another military campaign for another year.

Their use of the word “ineffectual” tells me that they failed in their goals, and I believe that they were big goals that even the shrewdest analysis did not know existed. It might seem incorrect to claim that they failed in Libya, since Libya is now in such turmoil. But I believe I’m correct.

If, and when NATO falls, I think that history will mark Libya as the beginning of that fall. We have “Brother Leader” Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi to thank for that. And we should never forget that, God bless him!!

1.) Those French guys are our guys, from Unite Continental. Guillaume, Nikola, the guys – We’ve been coordinating with them for a long time, after our initial Belgrade meeting in November 2013. I can’t say much more, but if you’ve heard any of my Time Monk Radio or Morris108 stuff, then you’ll have a better idea what I mean. Yes, international brigades – yes, this is what ”we” do.

2.) Sanctions and splits: Yes, you’re right, I’ve been saying that all along.

3.) Yeah, also another thing we’ve been saying – glad you agree!

4.) Those western clowns are really something else. It sure will be fun.

In complete honesty it took me a while to come to these conclusions. I went back and forth in my mind whether Russia was doing things right or not. Sometimes I would go into a rage at Putin for not intervening when his fellow Russians are being slaughtered across the border. Believe me it’s really hard to stomach seeing children being killed in Donetsk like they are in Gaza. I myself have two little grand children and the thought of seeing them killed in front of my eyes by bombs would make me go crazy. So knowing that Russia could have prevented this really gnawed at me. But now I’m at peace with the strategy of Russia and I undersand it fully after reading your analysis. And I’m sure that the scenes of carnage caused by the US supported nazis really upsets high Kremlin officials also. You really have to hand it to top officials like Putin and Sergei Lavrov. Their self discipline and intelligence knows no bounds. They keep the eye on the prize. If I would have been president of Russia I would have sent the full armed forces into Ukraine and wiped out all of the nazis and misfits all the way to Kiev. Of course the consequences would have been very bad. That’s why they’re in the position that they are and I am not. Thank god for that.

You know that I really sit in awe at the type of leaders and foreign secretaries that are in power in western Europe, US and Poland. It really does amaze me. You know I’m old enough to remember past presidents of the US, France and Germany and all of the foreign ministers going back to the early ’60s. I look back at people in the past like Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy and Nixon, Helmut Kohl and Schmidt of Germany, De Gaulle and Mitterand of France and secretaries of state such as Dean Rusk, Cyrus Vance, Henry Kissinger and Adlai Stevenson. Some of them were more vicious than others and some were responsible for terrible wars but I have to give all of them grudging respect because they were all very intelligent people and were worthy adversaries of the Soviet Union. Look at Adlai Stevenson’s performance in the UN exposing the USSR’s missiles in Cuba. It was a real class act. And they actually had real proof that Kruschev couldn’t deny. Now fast forward to 2003 and compare this to the sickening performance of Colin Powell regarding the so called proof of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. Fast forward again to the even more ridiculous performance of people like Susan Rice and Samantha Powers and you can see a real degradation of the type of characters that occupy these positions of leadership. I can go on and on. Just compare these past leaders that I mentioned above with the likes of Obama, John Kerry, Samantha Powers, Hollande, Cameron, Angela Merkel of Germany and Tusk of Poland and you realize that the western countries must be in a state of collapse because with creeps like these how can it not be. How can a society produce morons like these and not be in crisis. I wonder what goes through Putin’s and Lavrov’s minds when they have to talk with these people. I would love to be a fly on the wall in a meeting when Russian officials have to talk about western leaders. There must be some real good Russian jokes going around the Kremlin. (By the way there’s a joke going around about a reporter who asked President Obama what he thought of ISIS cutting off the heads of journalists where Obama replied “I’m sorry I can’t answer that now. I beheadin to the golf course”)

There’s one other observation that I want to make. I know that in judo you use your opponent’s energy and momentum to be used against him so that when he comes after you in full speed you then use that same energy to knock him off balance, force him down and score some points. Being a judo master maybe Putin is using this same priciple against his western opponents. The more energy the west expends on confrontation the more this same energy is put back in their face. Take the sanctions for instance. He used that same sanctions energy that was thrown at him to then apply even harsher sanctions against his opponent. I think his sanctions on agricultural products on all EU countries was a real masterstroke. That just shows the caliber of Russian leadership. So just as the moronic leadership in the west is a sign of their collapse the wise and intelligent leadership in Russia is a sign of their ascendancy.

Nice job. This puts things at a higher level. It’s good to go to that level now and then.

One of the goals for Russia has to be to try to remove the crazed anti-Russian belief system of so many. A number of observers have wondered if drugs and special TV frequencies haven’t been used. Not sure about what has been used, but look at this Ukrainian TV anchor on RT looking demonic or brainwashed:

It isn’t enough to have a non-oligarchical Novorossiya from Kharkov to Odessa if Kiev is left like that. Joining NATO or sabotaging nuclear plants or God-knows-what is possible. So this mass possession, if you will, needs to exorcised.

On the issue of 5th and 6th columns, a complicating factor is that the Russian elite have been divided, and the policy of the last 23 years of hoping for a united Ukraine that is non-NATO with at least a compromised position that favored the Eurasian Customs Union all the while keeping Russian bases in the Crimea has been tougher and tougher to maintain. Crazy people don’t even understand the concept of compromise. Yet, that has been the desire, along with trying to have a few friends in the Party of Regions, a party that seems to be widely hated, with the singular positive of not being run by violent fascists.

From a Russian point of view, it is possible that the events in the Ukraine will be a big positive over time. The 5th and 6th columnists are much more visible, and the sad nature of Russian liberals, who basically hate Russia, as Dostoevsky said, is also hard to hide. And this is going to allow Eurasianists to promote a move away from Europe. Galicia might gain independence and focus all of its passion on a European future. That, too, would not be a bad thing. A final positive is that one of the greatest things of all, and something the Anglo-American banking crowd fears more than anything, is a good example. If some oblasts in Novorossiya make a good country, something like Switzerland without the banks and oligarchs, well, the influence and energy of that would be tremendous.

Paul great points. I’ve been thinking lately that the rebellion in Novorossia is not only important for Novorossia and the world anti fascist movement but also important for Russia itself. The war there has really clarified to the Russian population and the elite in general the nature of the west. The liberal fifth column agents, like those that took over Russia during Yeltsin’s tenure, are getting more and more isolated and exposed for what they are. Now they don’t have a leg to stand on. One of the most important things that Putin has done since 2000, and you have to give him credit for this, is to unify communists, monarchists and nationalists in a grand coalition. In other words he has created the conditions for the unity of red and white. Putin kept the Soviet national anthem and other symbols of the Soviet Union like the hammer and sickle and the red star while at the same time has promoted symbols of the Czarist period such as the Russian Orthodox Church and the double headed eagle. He has created an open tent where all Russians, regardless of their political affinity (except for the Russian hating liberal and western oriented intellectuals) can feel a stake in. His leadership has encouraged society to look at the positive and the negative in both the Soviet period and the Czarist period. He has de-ideologized these above mentioned symbols to basically say that all historical periods of Russia from the beginning of Kiev Rus, through Ivan the Great, Peter the Great, Alexander I against Napoleon, Nicholas and through the Soviet Union are all important in its development as a people. Let bygones be bygones and from here we have to build a new Eurasian civilization remembering our past, both the good and the bad, but moving on from here. With an approval rating in the high 80’s you know that communists on one extreme and monarchists on the other extreme feel at home with him. This has been quite an accomplishment and the war in Novorossia has really galvanized these diverse forces into support for that struggle. Novorossia is a turning point in Russia itself.

Yes, you are right and Dugin has been chiefly responsible in consultation with Putin in regards to this. If you check out about 3 hours of discussion that Paul and I have had on his Time Monk Radio show, then you’ll hear us get into deep detail about this.

Have you done a new interview with Paul recently or are you talking about in the past. Ukraine fascists really have to brush up on their propaganda and their false flags. The downing of the Malaysia jetliner by the Ukarine air force was so obvious that anyone with a brain could see that. That lady with Ukraine Today must have been on mind controlling drugs. Wow. Couldn’t they find someone better from central casting. “OK master. Russia is the devil. Anything you say master.” Really pathetic the Kiev regime is.

Suppose you might want to comment on the ceasefire. Many serious commentators see this as being part of a Kremlin desire to keep a united Ukraine to the extent possible, and there is also the desire to get rid of any socialistic or non-oligarchicial tendencies in Novorossiya. Many see Putin as basically an arbiter amongst Russian oligarchs, and those oligarchs liked the old Ukraine a lot more than the new Novorossiya.

My gut feeling is that Putin is a Russian nationalist and Eurasian leaning. But not anti-oligarchy.

Unfortunately many serious commentators are for some reason not competent to the task. I can’t get into why this is so.

I have maintained from the word ‘go’ back in November that none of the headlines related much to actual reality at all, except as things which are being promoted for other reasons. It is possible to understand the tactics and strategy through the headlines, but not because one should literally accept the content of said headlines as being what is really going on.

No, the ceasefire will not hold, there in fact never was a ceasefire. Both sides had different reasons for talking up this myth. Kiev Junta wanted to regroup for another push. US is saying push push push. Novorossiya needed to gather up some PR, and time to re-supply, possible from the Russian side of the border. BUT they were going to do this anyway. They had different reasons for talking peace – the Europeans need this chatter for their own reasons. It has to do with population management and the stock markets, as well as perception management etc.

VS and others speaking of Strelkov have quite frankly no idea what they are going on about. For the record there has not been really one thing that VS has said which has come into fruition, nor has his understanding of the dynamics at work shown to be reflective either of what we already knew or what came to pass. Strelkov’s removal was indicative of nothing except that there were problems bringing the project under a centralized command, and Strelkov had rubbed some other commanders the wrong way, and other things relating to Vostok brigade and personality issues as well as competency. Strelkov had never before acted as supreme commander.

I think some ‘serious’ analysts may have some kind of authority complex. They have an irrational tendency to hate authority coupled with an innate need to follow the authorized stream of information. Whose prognostications have essentially come into fruition? I have to unapologetically say what others have already said – mine have. I can only engage in dime-store psychoanalysis as to why. I don’t think it has to do with raw brain power, but rather conceptual and ideological hangups. I don’t even look at CNN or BBC. I don’t even glance there except to see what isn’t true at all.

Back to the removal of Strelkov: It had nothing to do with socialism or his radicalism. He is a monarchist and a ‘White’, not a socialist ‘Red’. His removal has nothing to do with de-escalating anything.

Russia wants regime change in Kiev. Nothing short of that will change this. The US wants a never ending low-to-mid level conflict which will create permanent instability on Russia’s front lawn, and other problems between EU and Russia.

Never take the headlines at face value. That has been one of my main lines.

First off Joaqin who is VS. I agree with you. Strelkov was probably replaced because the new phase required new leadership. He performed a valuable function at a certain initial phase in the formation of the armed struggle but the formation of a real unified army in Novosossia required a different level of leadership which Strelkov was unable to provide. It’s as simple as that. Let’s not read more into it than that. And besides look at the situation now in Novorossia since the new leadership came in. What a difference. Results speak louder than words.

It’s true that Putin is a nationalist but he is someone who is above ideology as I said in my prior comments. Let’s be honest. Life under the monarchy had a lot of terrible things that went on but so was life under socialist USSR. So to be objective why should you be red or white. Why can’t you be just Russian and/or a human being. Enough with ideology. Putin and the Russian leadership want to unite and create as big a tent as possible, as I stated previously. I don’t think that ideology, at this time, has anything to do with Novorossia. I’m sure that Russia has larger issues in Ukraine other than what type of society will become of Novorossia. Those struggles will be sorted once Ukraine is free of US and EU dominance. By the way the Ukrainian version of oligarchs are so despicable that they make the Russian versions seem like Mother Teresa.

Russia’s aims may not all the time coincide with the leaders of Novorossia. It’s quite natural that their point of views are different at some points. Novorossia is a local problem that wants to be free of the Kiev Junta while Russia’s responsibility is worldwide. Novorossia primarily wants to be free from Kiev and secondarily wants the whole of Ukraine to be free. Russia primarily wants to get rid of the regime in Kiev and secondarily wants Novorossia to be free. You see the difference. Both Novorossia and Russia are in sync in general but tactically there may be differences because of the position both leaders are in. But in the end Novorossia must defer to Russia. It won’t do anybody any good if Lugansk and Donetsk are free but the rest of Ukraine goes fascist and Nato troops show up in Kharkov. Novorossia will always have to subordinate their goals to Russia’s goals so as to succeed with the big picture. Anyhow Russia does want Novorussia to be free but it has to be free within a free entire Ukraine.

A lot of what he posts is interesting and provides a good background, but you can certainly make the case that he gets too moralistic about things or is wrong in his predictions. In war, the goal is to win. If you have to sacrifice some people, that is just a sad price that must be paid.

Joaquin,

I wasn’t really getting into Strelkov so much, or VS for that matter. For one thing, there were several issues with him, as you pointed out. Competence, a desire to go to Kiev, and coming from Moscow, being the most obvious. It was more coming from the issue that a large number of folks on our side in this feel that they don’t really know where the Kremlin or Putin are coming from. Maybe I am wrong, but I said it in a few places a couple of months ago, Putin being quiet looked strong for the first couple of months, but that image got damaged by both time and the gradual testing of him by the junta with different kinds of massacres. We understand that he intends to see a non-hostile regime in Kiev, but what about the guys fighting? They aren’t fighting to see Yanukovich put back in with an oligarch as their governor. You had a very good piece on propaganda two months ago or so – it discussed images. Now that Strelkov and Gubarev are out of the picture, what are the icons to use?

An example is this tweet from Mark Sleboda:

“How many times now I have said on Russia & Western media there is divergence in goals & interests between NovoRossiya & Kremlin? No one listens.”
—
You had a couple of classic lines in that last comment.

-They have an irrational tendency to hate authority coupled with an innate need to follow the authorized stream of information.
–Yes, that is interesting. Have you noticed famous conspiracy personalities saying how bad the media are for the first twenty minutes and then they say that this latest conspiracy is true because it was in some European mainstream papers? Psychologically interesting.

-I don’t think it has to do with raw brain power, but rather conceptual and ideological hangups.
–Perhaps the issues are emotional. If we take the example of Putin, we are looking at the leader archetype. Many or most folks have been betrayed, some as recently as with Obama. So they have deep fears that they are putting their trust in someone who will deceive them, just like the other politicians.

Poland only has 12,000 combat troops in their entire army. Joaquin has said the militia numbers over 30,000 and this is without any actual Russian troops. They could send their whole army across the border and it wouldn’t be enough to do anything but slow them down. If the Russians actually attack, they couldn’t even slow them down.

While Poland has been frustrated by German reticence to confront Russia, and the Obama Administration seems less than keen for escalating the conflict beyond the Ukraine, it remains possible that a Polish engagement in Ukraine, even if “unsuccesful”, could serve deeper interests. Two could play the game of losing every battle. For example, it could make an escalation in other global conflicts harder to avoid, once public opinion in the US is softened up. Also, it might serve other ends. Seems that upcoming midterm elections in the the USA will occur before a such test of NATO, which could keep a lid on some of the bellicose tendencies of the electorate here. However… Perhaps the general elections of 2016, which bring the White House into play, will entice initiatives to embarrass NATO. In such an event, the velocity of the exceptionalist appeal to anxious voters would be accelerated by messaging which distorts lack of standing, and ignores relative weakness, portraying it as actually gutlessness. Such messaging could get traction, to the benefit of Texan elites, the defense industry, the Republicans, and their sponsors beyond the USA. In the most recent general elections, Mitt Romney, awkwardly and unsuccessfully, tried to pull off an somewhat analogous gambit with regard to events in Georgia. A lot more people here know where Poland is, than Georgia.

I think there is a steadily growing minority of elites in Poland also who see that they cannot have bad relations with both Germany and Russia – historically Poland, without Latvia and Lithuania in its dominion – was in a stronger position if it was on better terms with one or the other, but not neither.

I agree with you, yes, that two could play the game of losing every battle. And yes, this makes escalation in other global conflicts harder to avoid.

However, given the developments in the US over the last 15 years, which are truly disturbing though not shocking, I am not in the position to weigh to heavily the importance of public opinion in the US. What will the US public do in response to increasing US bellicosity? Elect a peace candidate who promises to reset relations with Russia and end the wars in the Middle-East? I don’t think that US public participation in their own staged political process is very meaningful outside of the local level, state level at the highest.

In terms of the US justifying its actions abroad, I do not recall any serious or heavy emphasis on what the majority of US citizens think or feel on the subject. Both Bush and Obama have wrestled with a general lack of US support, with the exception of the two or so years following 9-11. Beyond this, both presidents saw general support falling in all spheres, down below 40% approval.

http://russian.rt.com/article/50735 — Saw this today. I don’t think the marketing is the product, but its interesting to see what the new Polish PM wants her public and the world to think so far about this.

US public opinion is critical to support for extensive military campaigns. The Iraq occupation begun in 2003 could be seen to be the direct result of plan that included a false flag attack on NY, and an intensive misinforation operation, undertaken by an international group that had critical support in Riyadh. The apparent success of these bandits, in taking billions of dollars in contracts, corruption, and theft, is not lost on those who covet Ukranian resources. The hypothesis that there are two constellations of power players, established in deep political control, which at times compete here in the US, has been put forth by Peter Dale Scott. One, which he posits as the “Traders”, seeks to manipulate and control events to benefit their Wall Street based interests. Territorial control for expoitation of foreign found resources has not been a Trader focus, so much as cooption of a class of elites who essential get wealthy for doing the dirty work, in collaboration with the IMF. Frustrations with Jamaica, Argentina, Venezuela, etc. don’t mean that they have not had alot of success, as illustrated by Klien, in Shock Doctrine. However, another group here has emerged since WW2, one based in Texas yet internation in reach, which has been far less concerned with domestic legalities. The events surrounding 9/11 and the assasinations of the 60’s bear traces of their activity domestically. This success has had impact on World events, especially Iraq, Afghan, and potentially Ukraine. The failure of certain gambits does not mean that they will quit.